The power of correctly chosen words is definitely high. Nikon experienced this recently in a hard but clear manner: “A photographer is only as good as the equipment he uses…”.

This one sentence generated the incredible number of 4‘302 comments. The entire community was furious. The unfavourable comments about Nikon came thick and fast within a very short time.

But the community criticised not only the basic statement inherent in the sentence. There were numerous indignant comments about the fact that the posting was not gender-neutral.

Others also wondered whether the whole thing was perhaps just a PR gimmick. Now that Nikon has used the comment function to apologise, it is obvious that this is not the case. This was however lost in the storm of comments poking fun at the whole matter. One user was even kind enough to point out that a new status would probably have been more efficient. All the same, Nikon learned quickly from its community and set up a separate status message.

Canon was chuckling, because Canon was mentioned several times as a popular alternative.

And finally the most appropriate comment by a user: „OUCH, PR is only as good as the people you pay doing it.“

Link to the posting: https://www.facebook.com/nikon/posts/10150316773294620

Fig. 1: Nikon Facebook Wall